ZESSES SEGLIAS

Ma

[2026]

for female voice and ensemble (25')

composed for Schallfeld Ensemble and Helēna Sorokina

Ma is a story told in sounds: a setting, a scenery full of abstract associations gravitating around a central point, a wandering soul, sensual yet bodiless. The soul is mirrored in the voice, which wanders back and forth among sound islands that stand with little or no interaction with one another: prehistoric, carrying age-old wisdom and a deep knowledge of the world. The words derive from various poems and are indicated in a mystic way, as a trace of the original language. Time flows slowly; the piece lasts no more than an eternity and no less than a moment.

Ma (間) is a Japanese word for the interval between two things, in space or in time. It is not an absence but a presence of its own, and it is known only through what lies on either side of it.

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